Fund Objective

The Fund will aim to outperform the FTSE World Europe Index.

View on Past Performance

October was another poor month for equities with volatility (as measured by the VIX) climbing to record levels and indices reaching new multi-year lunches. Indeed, at one stage equities had produced their second worst annual performance ever (only 1931 was worse), before staging a slight rally into the month end. Unsurprisingly, in this environment small and mid cap stocks significantly underperformed large caps.In response to the deepening economic slowdown and ongoing financial sector crisis, governments and central banks around the world intervened with the largest ever bank bailout package.This was followed by coordinated rate cuts by the Fed, ECB, BoE, Riksbank and SNB.Yet again, with macro concerns continuing to dominate, sector moves were the main drivers of performance with large cap defensive sectors continuing to outperform. Cyclical sectors on the other hand continued to underperform.

Future Expectations

Deleveraging continued apace as hedge funds and other market participants sought to reduce their exposure. It is exceptionally difficult, if not impossible, to determine when this process will end but we remain convinced that it will throw up a number of interesting opportunities over the forthcoming months. In the meantime volatility will likely to remain high and we will seek to add value through judicious stock picking.

Fund Details